Unnatural death
“I’m _so_ sorry. Men always seem to take sugar in black coffee. Give it
to me—I’ll empty it away.”
“Allow me.” There was no slop-basin on the little table, but Wimsey
quickly got up and poured the coffee into the window-box outside.
“That’s all right. How about another cup for you?”
“Thank you—I oughtn’t to take it really, it keeps me awake.”
“Just a drop.”
“Oh, well, if you like.” She filled both cups and sat sipping quietly.
“Well—that’s all, really, but I thought perhaps I ought to let you
know.”
“It was very good of you,” said Wimsey.
They sat talking a little longer—about plays in Town (“I go out very
little, you know, it’s better to keep oneself out of the limelight on
these occasions”), and books (“I adore Michael Arlen”). Had she read
_Young Men in Love_ yet? No—she had ordered it from the library.
Wouldn’t Mr. Templeton have something to eat or drink? Really? A brandy?
A liqueur?
No, thank you. And Mr. Templeton felt he really ought to be slippin’
along now.
“No—don’t go yet—I get so lonely, these long evenings.”
There was a desperate kind of appeal in her voice. Lord Peter sat down
again.
She began a rambling and rather confused story about her “friend.” She
had given up so much for the friend. And now that her divorce was really
coming off, she had a terrible feeling that perhaps the friend was not
as affectionate as he used to be. It was very difficult for a woman, and
life was very hard.
And so on.
As the minutes passed, Lord Peter became uncomfortably aware that she
was watching him. The words tumbled out—hurriedly, yet lifelessly, like
a set task, but her eyes were the eyes of a person who expects
something. Something alarming, he decided, yet something she was
determined to have. It reminded him of a man waiting for an
operation—keyed up to it—knowing that it will do him good—yet shrinking
from it with all his senses.
He kept up his end of the fatuous conversation. Behind a barrage of
small-talk, his mind ran quickly to and fro, analysing the position,
getting the range. . .
Suddenly he became aware that she was trying—clumsily, stupidly and as
though in spite of herself—to get him to make love to her.
The fact itself did not strike Wimsey as odd. He was rich enough,
well-bred enough, attractive enough and man of the world enough to have
received similar invitations fairly often in his thirty-seven years of
life. And not always from experienced women. There had been those who
sought experience as well as those qualified to bestow it. But so
awkward an approach by a woman who admitted to already possessing a
husband and a lover was a phenomenon outside his previous knowledge.
Moreover, he felt that the thing would be a nuisance. Mrs. Forrest was
handsome enough, but she had not a particle of attraction for him. For
all her make-up and her somewhat outspoken costume, she struck him as
spinsterish—even epicene. That was the thing which puzzled him during
their previous interview. Parker—a young man of rigid virtue and limited
worldly knowledge—was not sensitive to these emanations. But Wimsey had
felt her as something essentially sexless, even then. And he felt it
even more strongly now. Never had he met a woman in whom “the great It,”
eloquently hymned by Mrs. Elinor Glyn, was so completely lacking.
Her bare shoulder was against him now, marking his broadcloth with white
patches of powder.
Blackmail was the first explanation that occurred to him. The next move
would be for the fabulous Mr. Forrest, or someone representing him, to
appear suddenly in the doorway, aglow with virtuous wrath and outraged
sensibilities.
“A very pretty little trap,” thought Wimsey, adding aloud, “Well, I
really must be getting along.”
She caught him by the arm.
“Don’t go.”
There was no caress in the touch—only a kind of desperation.
He thought, “If she really made a practice of this, she would do it
better.”
“Truly,” he said, “I oughtn’t to stay longer. It wouldn’t be safe for
you.”
“I’ll risk it,” she said.
A passionate woman might have said it passionately. Or with a brave
gaiety. Or challengingly. Or alluringly. Or mysteriously.
She said it grimly. Her fingers dug at his arm.
“Well, damn it all, _I’ll_ risk it,” thought Wimsey. “I must and will
know what it’s all about.”
“Poor little woman.” He coaxed into his voice the throaty, fatuous tone
of the man who is preparing to make an amorous fool of himself.
He felt her body stiffen as he slipped his arm round her, but she gave a
little sigh of relief.
He pulled her suddenly and violently to him, and kissed her mouth with a
practised exaggeration of passion.
He knew then. No one who has ever encountered it can ever again mistake
that awful shrinking, that uncontrollable revulsion of the flesh against
a caress that is nauseous. He thought for a moment that she was going to
be actually sick.
He released her gently, and stood up—his mind in a whirl, but somehow
triumphant. His first instinct had been right, after all.
“That was very naughty of me,” he said, lightly. “You made me forget
myself. You will forgive me, won’t you?”
She nodded, shaken.
“And I really must toddle. It’s gettin’ frightfully late and all that.
Where’s my hat? Ah, yes, in the hall. Now, good-bye, Mrs. Forrest, an’
take care of yourself. An’ thank you ever so much for telling me about
what your friend saw.”
“You are really going?”
She spoke as though she had lost all hope.
“In God’s name,” thought Wimsey, “what does she want? Does she suspect
that Mr. Templeton is not everything that he seems? Does she want me to
stay the night so that she can get a look at the laundry-mark on my
shirt? Should I suddenly save the situation for her by offering her Lord
Peter Wimsey’s visiting-card?”
His brain toyed freakishly with the thought as he babbled his way to the
door. She let him go without further words.
As he stepped into the hall he turned and looked at her. She stood in
the middle of the room, watching him, and on her face was such a fury of
fear and rage as turned his blood to water.
CHAPTER XVI
A Cast-Iron Alibi
“_Oh, Sammy, Sammy, why vorn’t there an alleybi?_”
_Pickwick Papers_
Miss Whittaker and the youngest Miss Findlater had returned from their
expedition. Miss Climpson, most faithful of sleuths, and carrying Lord
Peter’s letter of instructions in the pocket of her skirt like a
talisman, had asked the youngest Miss Findlater to tea.
As a matter of fact, Miss Climpson had become genuinely interested in
the girl. Silly affectation and gush, and a parrot-repetition of the
shibboleths of the modern school were symptoms that the experienced
spinster well understood. They indicated, she thought, a real
unhappiness, a real dissatisfaction with the narrowness of life in a
country town. And besides this, Miss Climpson felt sure that Vera
Findlater was being “preyed upon,” as she expressed it to herself, by
the handsome Mary Whittaker. “It would be a mercy for the girl,” thought
Miss Climpson, “if she could form a genuine attachment to a young man.
It is natural for a schoolgirl to be _schwärmerisch_—in a young woman of
twenty-two it is thoroughly undesirable. That Whittaker woman encourages
it—she would, of course. She likes to have someone to admire her and run
her errands. And she prefers it to be a stupid person, who will not
compete with her. If Mary Whittaker were to marry, she would marry a
rabbit.” (Miss Climpson’s active mind quickly conjured up a picture of
the rabbit—fair-haired and a little paunchy, with a habit of saying,
“I’ll ask the wife.” Miss Climpson wondered why Providence saw fit to
create such men. For Miss Climpson, men were intended to be masterful,
even though wicked or foolish. She was a spinster made and not born—a
perfectly womanly woman.)
“But,” thought Miss Climpson, “Mary Whittaker is not of the marrying
sort. She is a professional woman by nature. She has a profession, by
the way, but she does not intend to go back to it. Probably nursing
demands too much sympathy—and one is under the authority of the doctors.
Mary Whittaker prefers to control the lives of chicken. ‘Better to reign
in hell than serve in heaven.’ Dear me! I wonder if it is uncharitable
to compare a fellow-being to Satan. Only in poetry, of course—I daresay
that makes it not so bad. At any rate, I am certain that Mary Whittaker
is doing Vera Findlater no good.”
Miss Climpson’s guest was very ready to tell about their month in the
country. They had toured round at first for a few days, and then they
had heard of a delightful poultry farm which was for sale, near
Orpington in Kent. So they had gone down to have a look at it, and found
that it was to be sold in about a fortnight’s time. It wouldn’t have
been wise, of course, to take it over without some inquiries, and by the
greatest good fortune they found a dear little cottage to let,
furnished, quite close by. So they had taken it for a few weeks, while
Miss Whittaker “looked round” and found out about the state of the
poultry business in that district, and so on. They _had_ enjoyed it so,
and it was delightful keeping house together, right away from all the
silly people at home.
“Of course, I don’t mean you, Miss Climpson. You come from London and
are so much more broadminded. But I simply can’t stick the Leahampton
lot, nor can Mary.”
“It is very delightful,” said Miss Climpson, “to be _free_ from the
conventions, I’m sure—especially if one is in company with a _kindred
spirit_.”
“Yes—of course Mary and I are tremendous friends, though she is so much
cleverer than I am. It’s absolutely settled that we’re to take the farm
and run it together. Won’t it be wonderful?”
“Won’t you find it rather dull and lonely—just you two girls together?
You mustn’t forget that you’ve been accustomed to see quite a lot of
young people in Leahampton. Shan’t you miss the tennis-parties, and the
young men, and so on?”
“Oh, no! If you only knew what a stupid lot they are! Anyway, I’ve no
use for men!” Miss Findlater tossed her head. “They haven’t got any
ideas. And they always look on women as sort of pets or playthings. As
if a woman like Mary wasn’t worth fifty of them! You should have heard
that Markham man the other day—talking politics to Mr. Tredgold, so that
nobody could get a word in edgeways, and then saying, ‘I’m afraid this
is a very dull subject of conversation for you, Miss Whittaker,’ in his
condescending way. Mary said in that quiet way of hers, ‘Oh, I think the
_subject_ is anything but dull, Mr. Markham.’ But he was so stupid, he
couldn’t even grasp that and said, ‘One doesn’t expect ladies to be
interested in politics, you know. But perhaps you are one of the modern
young ladies who want the flapper’s vote.’ Ladies, indeed! Why are men
so insufferable when they talk about ladies?”
“I think men are apt to be _jealous_ of women,” replied Miss Climpson,
thoughtfully, “and jealousy _does_ make people rather _peevish_ and
_ill-mannered_. I suppose that when one would _like_ to despise a set of
people and yet has a horrid suspicion that one _can’t_ genuinely despise
them, it makes one _exaggerate_ one’s contempt for them in conversation.
That is why, my dear, I am always _very_ careful not to speak sneeringly
about men—even though they _often deserve_ it, you know. But if I did,
everybody would think I was an _envious old maid_, wouldn’t they?”
“Well, I mean to be an old maid, anyhow,” retorted Miss Findlater. “Mary
and I have quite decided that. We’re interested in things, not in men.”
“You’ve made a good start at finding out how it’s going to work,” said